


futile devices

by Kaatiba



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Angst, Bipolar Disorder, Bipolar Ian Gallagher, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Child Abuse, Extended Scene, Gap Filler, Gen, Hurt Ian Gallagher, Hurt/Comfort, Ian Gallagher-centric, M/M, Older Sibling Fiona Gallagher, POV Mickey Milkovich, Protective Mickey Milkovich, Season/Series 04, Season/Series 05, Slight Canon Divergence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-02
Updated: 2020-01-05
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:34:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22081687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaatiba/pseuds/Kaatiba
Summary: An extended version of Mickey's interactions with Ian as he struggles with his Bipolar DisorderORMickey & the Gallagher's actually interact and try to take care of Ian as best they can.
Relationships: Fiona Gallagher & Ian Gallagher, Fiona Gallagher & Ian Gallagher & Lip Gallagher, Ian Gallagher/Mickey Milkovich
Comments: 8
Kudos: 96





	1. the only one

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So this was originally posted with a one-shot collection I posted "Firecrotch" which started as more of a light and fluffy related one-shot collection, but this chapter became slightly longer and angstier and inspired me to write the second chapter of this which I posted here first under this title......So I'm gonna add this here and continue this fic as a more in-depth exploration of Ian's struggle with Bipolar and how Mickey (& all the Gallaghers) are a part of it.
> 
> So, bye bye pure fluff, angst and hurt/comfort, here we come. 
> 
> \-------------------------
> 
> Set in a semi-divergent late S4 where Mickey came out, Ian lives with him, but hasn’t had his depressive episode yet, it’s the middle of winter, and Frank isn’t dying or in the hospital, and everyone else lives at the Gallagher house.

_ "Standing on the cliff face  
Highest foe you'll ever grace  
It scares me half to death" _

_ **-Bastille, Icarus** _

* * *

It’s only been two days since Ian went all Glenn Close and tried to slash Kenyatta’s neck in the middle of the Milkovich kitchen. It would’ve been a good riddance, but Mickey knows Gallagher would be haunted by an actual murder on his conscience. 

After everything that’s happened, Mickey still looks at Ian and sees a soul that is uncorrupted, despite growing up in the South Side. Fuck that piece of shit for hitting his sister, but he’s won’t let the situation blacken Ian’s heart of gold.

That’s why Mickey’s been tailing Ian wherever he goes. Ian knows he’s worried about him, but in his energetic, seven-thoughts-ahead state, he tolerates Mickey’s mother henning. Whenever Ian sees Mickey looking into his face in concern, he pecks him on the cheek and continues to ramble ideas or hum songs or drags Mickey to wherever to do whatever. 

Mickey loses his breath just listening to Firecrotch speak these days. Not to even mention the marathon sex. Mickey is surprised he can still stand, let alone chase Ian up and down the neighborhood every day. 

That’s how Mickey ends up in the Gallagher kitchen the night that shit goes down. 

Fiona and Lip, also watching Ian with very thinly veiled concern these days, had convinced him to come home for a good, old-fashioned Gallagher family dinner. Mickey could only imagine what those entailed: a Milkovich “family dinner” consisted of Mandy making everyone pizza rolls, while his brother cleaned the guns, and their dad discussed a new hit. Standing in the dilapidated, but still cozy, yellow kitchen, Mickey thinks what he’s always known; Ian grew up differently.

When Mickey had walked in, hair gelled back in a semblance of effort, Lip had cast him a weary glance and Fiona a tight lipped smile. The rest of the Gallagher clan was crowded around the TV and yelling at it. Behind the curtains, he saw Wallace Street darkening as the sun set. 

Ian, who’d been up to see the sun rise, was still hopelessly energetic as he bounded into the living room to general yells of delight and scooped up each of his little siblings in turn, swinging Liam around in the air. Mickey watched as Ian rocked him on his hip like he always did with Yevgeny.

He was distracted when Fiona shoved a handful of silverware into his hands, “Make yourself useful, make the table,” she ordered. His gut reaction was to say “fuck you” but he realized her tone wasn’t unkind, and she was trying to help him participate. Looking into her tired but steady gaze, he wondered if the Milkovich household could’ve been functional if they still had a mother figure, or if they’d still be such a shit show. He begins setting the table, not really knowing which utensil should go where, but not really caring. He can hear Ian laughing, just a little too high pitched, from the couch. 

20 minutes later, Mickey is seated at the table, surrounded by 6 Gallaghers, and wondering how this became his life. “I made your favorite,” Fiona ruffles Ian’s hair as she sets down a steaming casserole dish of lasagna. “I even made you some of your rabbit food,” she winks at the redhead as she sets down a serving dish with green beans. Ian beams right back at his sisters, “Thank you, Fi.” Mickey is staring at the green bean plate. He can’t remember the last time anyone in the Milkovich house ate, much less served fresh vegetables. He squirms in his seat, but feels Ian’s leg brush his. 

Mickey is relieved when the quiet domestic moment passes, and the table descends into chaos. Gallaghers being loud and obnoxious, that he can understand. While he’d grown up with sullen, anxious silences interrupted by insults and curses, the Gallaghers manage to keep up at least five animated conversations at any given moment. Quips are being thrown back and forth, hands swiping crescent rolls, inside jokes, criss crossing from one end of the table to the other. Even Liam in his high chair is looking around at his siblings and muttering emphatically. 

Mickey doesn’t say anything, but he eats the admittedly good food and listens to everyone talk. He admires the way Ian’s face lights up when Carl asks him a question about knife throwing or Lip says something snarky and condescending. Mickey’s feels overly warm, but he’s not unhappy. 

He think Fiona warned her siblings not to comment on Mickey’s presence because even Lip doesn’t pick at him out loud. Obviously they’ve decided to cultivate a sense of normalcy to avoid one of Ian’s mood swings or to stop him from walking right out, back to Mickey’s, and not returning to Wallace Street for weeks. 

The food goes quickly, and Ian is immediately up on his feet to help Fiona clear the table and do the dishes. Mickey gets up to steal a beer from the fridge. Spirits are still high when their bright, warm bubble is burst by a gust of cold Chicago wind and the sound of a door slam. 

“Shit, I forgot to bolt the door on our way in,” Ian turns around, and they all look to see a drunk and stumbling Frank, rubbing his nose in the doorway, muttering, “Make me walk up through the back door of my own house..”

“It’s not your house,” Fiona says forcibly calmly. Lip is watching Ian, “Get out, Frank.”

“But it’s freezing out there! You don’t want your flesh and blood to die out in the snow!” Frank says grandly, sweeping his arm, and showing off the holes in the winter coat he somehow snagged. Mickey thinks he’s drunk enough to keep him quite warm for the night. 

“Wouldn’t be much of a loss would it?” At that, Mickey glances over to see Ian with his signature angry, tight lipped pout and flaring nose. He has a sense of deja vu, but before he can think of a good way to diffuse this new development, Frank is off on a tangent. 

“How soulless of you,” he guffaws, “get it,” he gestures towards Ian’s hair, “the _soulless_ _ginger_!” No one else laughs or moves. 

He staggers forward a step, face resetting into something more serious and cruel “always the dumb and quiet ones you have to watch out for,” he pokes Ian in the chest, “the spawn of a cunt and another blood traitor,” he spits, and Mickey thinks he’ll have to hold Ian back, but it’s Frank who moves first.

Fiona shrieks as Frank delivers a surprisingly powerful right hook to Ian’s left cheek, knocking him against the counter where he trips and lands on the floor, dishes coming down on top of him.

Mickey hears all the Gallaghers yelling angrily now, but it gets lost against the buzzing of his ears, and he vaguely registers Frank pulling back a dirty boot to kick Ian while he’s down, before he sees red, and the next thing he knows, he’s hauled the drunkard off and thrown him back against the laundry machine so hard it leaves a faint dent. 

He delivers several kicks and punches in rapid succession until the Gallagher patriarch vomits against the linoleum. Mickey instinctively flinches away in disgust before hauling Frank up by the collar to meet his gaze.

“If I ever see or hear you lay a hand on  _ him  _ again..I’ll..” Mickey’s so angry he can barely think. He’s delivered so many beatings before, but he’s taken aback by the emotions coursing through him right now. “I’ll chop you into little bits and throw you in the Chicago river, and that’s a promise, not a threat,” he growls. 

He steps back, dropping Frank back down in disgust. He sense Lip at his elbow, and together, with Carl somewhat helping, they haul Frank out of the house and dump him into a nearby snowbank.

They re-enter the kitchen, dead bolting the door this time, and walk in to see Fiona running her hand through her hair and trying to help Ian hold an ice pack to his cheek, though he keeps batting her away. Liam is crying, and Debbie is nervously holding a broom and staring at the mess of broken dishes at Ian’s feet. 

Mickey, expecting the incident to send Ian flying off the handle, is surprised to see Ian looking rather calm and resigned. No one except Liam is making any noise. As his siblings start to crowd him, Ian shrugs them off petulantly and heads upstairs. 

Mickey lingers a minute to watch the Gallaghers watch Ian leave with equally resigned and concerned expressions. Lip and Fiona have a silent conversation. Carl phones Vee without having to be asked. They all seem upset, but not surprised. It feels like they’ve been through this before, like they have a routine down. 

Mickey isn’t a stranger to domestic violence. It’s almost all he’s ever known. He knows what it’s like to have an abusive father. He knows what it’s like to be in a household where everyone lives in fear. But sitting in the Gallagher’s kitchen, with its finger paintings on the fridge, eating a home cooked meal, he’d thought they were different. 

Mickey knew Frank Gallagher was a good for nothing drunk, but he hadn’t known he hit his kids. It hurts him more than he can describe to realize even the most functional Southside family he knows, that he’d begun to romanticize in his head, is just as fucked up as his in this regard.

He runs up the stairs and into Ian’s old room to see him icing his own cheek, and changing his shirt since the old one was stained with blood. Mickey, quickly panicking began scanning Ian for the source of the blood (Yeah, his right eye was already starting to bruise, but there shouldn’t be any blood!) when he notices a cut on Ian’s right hand. Just as suddenly, he realizes what happened; when Ian fell, he tried to catch himself with his right hand, only to cut it on a shard of a shatter plate. 

Mickey has to take a deep breath to still the shaking in his own right hand, whose knuckles are already turning their own shade of blue. 

Ian hasn’t looked at him yet. He pulls a piece of gauze out of his dresser, and Mickey doesn’t want to think about why that’s there, but he can’t stop thinking about it. He helps Ian cut a piece of the bandage after his hands fumble, still shaking with adrenaline. Mickey helps him wrap the cut, then leaves his hand there, cradling Ian’s larger palm in his own throbbing knuckles. 

His voice is gruff, “This happen a lot?” Ian frowns and shrugs, “Nah, Frank isn’t physically violent, just an ass.”

Mickey grabs his chin, lifting Ian’s green eyes to meet his own. They look vulnerable but defiant, like the first time they got together. Mickey Milkovich fell in love with Ian the second he saw that look, even though it took him forever to admit it to himself. 

He doesn’t have to say anything, just raises his eyebrows, squeezes Ian’s hand, and waits for him to speak. 

Ian cracks, frowning deeper, “He only...I’m the only one,” his voice quavers just a bit, “He’s always hated me the most, and I don’t care, I  _ don’t _ ! I just...I hate the way the others always look at me afterwards, you know?”

Mickey does know. It’s why Mandy yells at him everytime he so much as mentions her bruises, why Mickey couldn't stomach looking at Ian for days after Svetlana. Mickey knows pride, and he knows shame, and he knows how well they walk hand in hand.

“And your siblings haven’t done shit about it?” Mickey asks, indignant now, having mulled it over. 

“What’re they supposed to do, Mick? We already have to kick him out at least once a month as it is.”

“I don’t know,” Mickey scowls, “Kill him!”

Ian huffs a laugh, wincing as he pulls at his swollen cheek, but still smiling. “Not all of us are so well-equipped for murder, tough guy,” he pokes Mickey in the stomach, but Mickey is not distracted, “You seemed halfway there with Kenyatta the other day,” Mickey grumbles, regretting it immediately when Ian pulls back. 

“I was just so  _ angry _ ...like..Fuck, Mickey, I was  _ so so _ fucking angry, you know?”

Mickey just beat the shit out of Frank in fury, so yeah, he kinda knows. He watches Ian look more and more frustrated as he struggles to find the right words. Mickey thinks this is the closest to “Old Ian” he’s been since he came home. 

“I’ve just been so.. _ so.. _ ,” he looks at Mickey pleadingly, “everything is so  _ sharp _ , Mick, my skin feels electric, and it’s like there’s no time left, and I can’t not move, or I’ll die, and everything is so, so  _ real _ ...I don’t..” 

Ian is starting to get worked up now, so Mickey, pushes him down to sit on the bed, and kisses the top of his head. “You don’t have to explain it all to me tonight,” Mickey sits down, and Ian rests his head on his shoulder. 

They can hear the door open downstairs, and Vee’s voice carries up. Ian rolls his eyes, “It’s just a bruise, they didn’t need to call her,” he mumbles. Regardless, Mickey stands up, and lets the old nurse in when she knocks. He pats Ian on the shoulder, “ We can talk more about it in the morning.” 

Ian sends him a small smile, eyes tired, and calm, and lucid.

\--------------------------------------------------

Mickey wakes up slowly, wondering why his body is curled up so uncomfortably and his hand is aching, before he remembers the events of the night before he’d crashed in Ian’s narrow bed. 

He looks around for Ian himself, but doesn’t find him. The bed is cold. He wearily trudges downstairs in the same jeans and sweater he wore the previous night and finds Ian whizzing around the kitchen, where just 12 hours ago, he lay crumpled up. 

“Ian?”

Ian is loudly and emphatically telling some story about the boys at the club to an enraptured Carl and sleeping Liam. Lip is at another stool, frowning at his little brother. Mickey frowns at him too. He has a shiner, and his right eye is swollen almost shut, but he’s grinning as much as he can under the circumstances. He finally whirls around.

“Mickey!” he yells joyfully, “Come grab a PB&J!” He points to a plate sitting on the counter, stacked nearly a foot high with dozens of sandwiches. Carl happily munches one, but says, “I thought we were out of Peanut Butter?” Ian laughs, although it wasn’t funny. “We were! I ran to the Aldi this morning to pick up a jar, or...10 jars,” he shrugs.

Lip’s frown deepens, “It’s not even seven yet, you didn’t catch the L, did you?”

Ian shrugs, “I ran there, training and all,” he winks like it’s an inside joke, but Lip looks at Mickey this time and says, “That’s ten blocks away and it’s still snowing out.”

Mickey makes a fist with his damaged hand, feeling the skin stretch and tear. He has the sudden urge to cry. 

They’d come so close last night to...Mickey doesn’t know what, but he’d gone to sleep feeling hopeful. Now, Ian’s rambling fills his ears, the kitchen is cold, and he knows they’re right back to where they started, and all he can do is watch the boy he loves make a hundred sandwiches and laugh at nothing.


	2. the only one

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Set in S5 ep 6, extension of the scene where Mickey & Fiona visit Ian in the hospital

_ "All the time we spent in bed, counting miles before we said, fall in love and fall apart, things will end before they start." _

_ **-Sufjan Stevens** _

* * *

“Ian…”

Mickey fidgets in his nice shirt that Svetlana ironed for him the other night. His hair is gelled and combed, and his neck is sweating, but his gut feels like ice. He looks over at Fiona for a hint as to how to react.

How to react to his drugged up boyfriend (And God, that’s twice in 48 hours he’s told a complete stranger what he and Ian are; it’s progress, but under the worst of circumstances.) Ian had looked at him when he’d first spoken, but there was nothing in his eyes. It wasn’t  _ his  _ Ian. He smelt like Ian, and felt like Ian, but Mickey struggled to recognize him.

He wasn’t sure Ian recognized him at all. 

Fiona managed to force Ian to sit down on the table between them, and Mickey feels sick to his stomach listening to her speak to Ian in her softest baby voice. The room starts getting too hot for him, and his collar is too stiff. He wants Ian to say something, anything.

Instead, Ian just stars right over Fiona’s messy hair at a pair of old looney's playing bridge or something. Everyone in this nuthouse gives Mickey the creeps, and he thinks that  _ his  _ Ian can’t possibly belong here with these people. Sure, Ian’s off his rocker, but he’s not  _ crazy _ -crazy...right?

He looks at the redhead closely for some kind of reassurance, but all he and Fiona get is a vacant, overly polite question about Yevgeny. It almost chokes him, but Mickey responds as upbeat as possible. Meanwhile, the pie is getting cold in its tin foil, and Mickey still feels like he’s a degree away from exploding. 

After watching a game of pool for far too long, Ian looks like he’s about to make a move to get up and leave, and Mickey’s heart does a painful little twist in his chest. He has to do something. “Svet misses having you to help change Yev’s diapers,” he lies, full well knowing she’s packing Ian’s shit up as they speak, “He always gets whiny when I do them, picky kid, prefers the way you do it.” 

Mickey’s grasping at straws, but as predicted, Ian’s bizarre hyperfixation on Yevgeny doesn’t fail, and he finally angles towards Mickey to listen, though slowly, like he’s moving through corn syrup. 

His mouth opens hesitantly, “I ran out of diapers on the way,” Ian muses, directing his statement at the back of the wall. It takes Mickey a moment to realize he’s talking about the road trip from hell. 

Mickey coughs awkwardly, not up to scolding Ian right now, “That’s..that’s alright,” he finishes lamely, turning to Fiona to pick up the slack here. She tries to oblige. 

“Remember that time we went on that road trip to Canada? You and Lip wouldn’t stop singing some dumb kids’ cartoon song,” Mickey listens to this childhood memory with only vague interest like the outsider he is, “we were in that RV that Frank ‘borrowed’ from his dealer, but it was such a piece of shit, that we didn’t get halfway to Milwaukee before we had two flat tires,” she smiles reminiscently. “You kept trying to patch the holes up with chewing gum,” she smiles at Ian indulgently, and it doesn’t seem like he’s very interested in Fiona’s story, but he’s not looking at the patients doing arts and crafts anymore, and Mickey takes that for progress.

Mickey, now mildly interested, asks, “So what? How’d you get back?”He and Fiona are both shocked and swivel their heads around when Ian answers.

“Frank passed out,” his voice is strangely soft, “and Monica went out and did a few Johns, got enough to buy us bus tickets back to Chicago.” Ian grimaces a bit at that last part, something like guilt, or a very watered down version of it appearing on his face. Mickey, for one, is just glad the meds seem to be wearing off just enough for Ian to experience some real emotions. 

Fiona lower lip does a weird quiver, before she asks, “You..you remember that? You couldn't have been more than 8!” Ian just shrugs, whatever engagement he’d shown in the conversation, gone as soon as it came.

Fiona leans forward to put a hand on Ian’s knee in what Mickey can’t help but see as an almost compulsive, maternal gesture, but as indifferent as Ian seems, the minute she touches him he flinches, and she immediately withdraws looking like she touched a hot stove, doe eyes wide and shiny.

“Ian?” she asks meekly.

“Can we go home?” He looks lost and confused again. He looks at Mickey like he just realized he was there. Fiona’s eyes are definitely shiny now. “In a day or two, sweetheart.”

“They won’t let me leave,” Ian mumbles, eyes getting big, and something like panic tingeing his voice. “I tried, but he wouldn’t..” Ian clumsily gives a whole body shrug, raising his arms, and letting them fall farther in front of him. 

Only now does Mickey notice the incredibly faint but still somewhat recognizable bruises dotting Ian’s pale arms. He doesn’t grab out to hold them and examine them like he wants to, instead he points and asks, “What are those from?”

It takes Ian several moments to look down at himself and remember. He looks at Mickey with doe eyes (and for the first time, Mickey can see a family resemblance between him and Fiona) and says, “I wanted to see Yevgeny! I...I had to get back to him ...I swear I wasn’t gone for that long ...” He starts staring out towards the nearby emergency exit longingly, and Mickey notices the security personnel hovering nearby. 

“Did one of those guys do that to you?” Mickey asks, starting to catch on, but not liking it one bit. Ian nods mutely, confirming Mickey’s sinking suspicion. He cracks his knuckles out of habit.

“What kind of joint are they running here?” he starts angrily, “drugging their patients into insanity then beating on them? That’s gotta be fucking illegal, I don’t..This is like something on the news….we can’t..” he looks over at Fiona desperately for support, the idea of breaking Ian out of here giving him something tangible to latch onto, but Fiona isn’t as fired up as he is. 

“Ian, honey, did you try to leave the hospital wing?” Ian blinks. Fiona breathes in deeply, “And did they..did somebody stop you?” Ian blinks more forcefully, and half nods.

Mickey just looks at Ian, whose eyes are huge and pale like saucers and who looks so much like a child that Mickey can’t stand it. He wants to fling something at Ian like he did when they were kids just to snap him out of it, but he knows it won’t work.

“Fiona...we can’t”

“We have to.”

“But..!”

“It’s,” Fiona takes a shuddering sigh, “It’s all to protect him, it’s…” a tear escapes one of her cheeks to be promptly wiped away, “He’s a danger to himself right now…” She’s whispering, but there’s no point. Ian has long since checked out of the conversation. He’s swaying back and forth and blinking rapidly.

“I’m..tired..gonna go..” Ian says at length and stumbles to his feet to meander back to where Mickey assumes he sleeps. Ian doesn’t look back at him. Mickey doesn’t follow. He can’t look at Fiona, and he’s shaking with barely bridled fury, tempered only by the absolute cold coating his insides. He wants to smash the stupid pie on the ground. He wants to strangle one of the orderlies. 

He wants it all to be a nightmare. 


	3. List

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Extra gap-filler scene from 5x09
> 
> *trigger warning for mention of suicide attempt*

_ "Nothing's gonna hurt you baby  
As long as you're with me you'll be just fine  
Nothing's gonna hurt you baby  
Nothing's gonna take you from my side" _

** _-Cigarettes After Sex_ **

* * *

Mickey walks back into Ian’s room from the bathroom to find him sitting knees to chest, doodling on a piece of notebook paper. It reminds Mickey of Ian’s frantic idea scribbling when he first got back, but the Ian in front of him is much calmer, or at least too exhausted to write quickly. 

Mickey, crawls back into the little twin bed, seating himself back to the wall, shoulder to shoulder with Ian. He doesn’t say anything for a minute, just contents himself to appreciate the feel of their bodies touching. He lets his eyes aimlessly wander around the room. 

On the back of the door is the old stop sign. Mickey wonders whether Ian and Lip stole it from somewhere. On the wall are layers upon layers of old posters. There are pictures of fancy race cars, models and pin-up style pictures like the ones Mickey used to litter his walls with in his desperate attempts to play straight. Of course, there’s also all of Ian’s army propaganda, american flags, and all the hopes and dreams of young Cadet Ian Gallagher in collage form for everyone to see.

Mickey doesn’t like looking at it. Not only had he spent the last three years having nightmares of Ian getting blown to bits by an IED in a country he’d never heard of, but it reminds him of everything Ian’s lost. 

All Mickey had ever wanted growing up was to survive. He’d never allowed himself to truly _ want _anything (or anyone) until Ian Gallagher burst into his life and dragged him kicking and screaming out of the closet. But Ian had always knew who he was and what he wanted. It’s why he was such a confident, intimidating figure even when he was short and scrawny and freckled face. Mickey can’t imagine what it’s like to want one thing for your entire life, to devote yourself to something so completely, just to have it ripped away by nothing more than fate and some bad genes. 

Mickey wonders whether it’s worse to have never been able to cultivate dreams, or to have a dream and watch it wither away. Then he wonders whether he needs to go grab a beer since he’s getting so girly and philosophical. 

He draws himself back to the present, and pokes Ian in the knee. Ian swivels his head slowly. His face is mostly blank, but Mickey can see flickers of gratitude and love behind his blue green eyes. Overmedicated or not, Mickey knows Ian.

“Whatcha writin, Red?”

Ian shrugs. “Doodles,” he tilts the pad so Mickey can see some random swirls and zig zags filling the corner.

“What’s that?” Mickey straightens and gestures at the title written in Ian’s scrawl at the top of the lined page. It just says “List.”

Ian slowly shrugs again, but he doesn’t meet Mickey’s eye. “The lady, y’know at the clinic..she suggested it..” he trails off looking at his pencil heavily. 

With realization that feels uncomfortably similar to heartburn, he remembers the conversation with the nurse at the clinic earlier that day when they’d gone to get Ian some new pills.She’d told Ian to make a list of people to call, in case he felt the urge to hurt himself. The thought makes Mickey as sick now as it did in the clinic. He’d told the nurse, “What the fuck does he need that for, he’s got me?” Mickey, calmer now that he’s had a chance to cool down and he’s sitting in a familiar spot with Ian at his side, tries not to react too angrily or indignantly. 

“Do you,” Mickey coughs to hide what might’ve been a voice crack, “Do you need one?”

Ian looks at him again, face stoic, but eyes confused and vulnerable, “I don’t know,” he says, and Mickey knows he’s just being honest. “I might.”

Mickey feels the back of his throat tighten, and he looks down so Ian won’t see all the traitorous emotions flitting across his face at that confession. He doesn’t want Ian to feel guilty for being straight with him. 

“Ok.” Mickey thinks he should earn an award for how steady his voice comes out, though his mind is still flooded with panicked thoughts. Images of Ian’s mother bleeding out on the Gallagher kitchen floor based on stories he’s heard from Carl and Debbie. He’s never actually met Monica, and in his imagination, she’s the spitting image of Ian. 

“Ok?” Ian asks, sounding only mildly surprised.

“Yeah, uh, yeah...who’s on it?” Mickey mumbles. 

Ian shrugs (he’s been doing that a lot lately). “Dunno. Haven’t written anything down yet.” And sure enough, there’s only blank spaces beneath his header. Seems he only got that far before he started doodling. “Guess I can do it now.” Ian leans forward a bit and writes something down. Mickey doesn’t want to invade his privacy by looking unless he knows Ian wants to show him, but there’s a seed of anxiety in Mickey’s chest. 

Mickey just watches Ian in his peripheral, trying not to pry, while Ian softly chews on the end of his pencil and slowly, after some pauses to think, keeps writing down more things. 

When he’s done, Ian hands the notepad wordlessly to Mickey. It just says:

_ LIST _

_ -Mick _

_ -Fi _

_ -Lip _

_ -Mandy _

Mickey is relieved his name is on there, and at the top, because for a jealous, self-conscious second, he’d doubted it. Then he frowns a bit.

“That’s only four,” he points out. “Did the Doc Lady tell you how many you should have?” Suddenly, despite his initial aversion to the list, he’s worried it’s inadequate. If they _ have _to make a list for the sake of Ian’s safety, it better damned well be a good one.

“The last ones are all unnecessary already,” Ian says, unbothered, “I have you.” Mickey’s heart flutters at the unwavering faith in that statement.

“Yesterday-” He feels a new surge of guilt for not being there for Ian when he first got out, probably leaving him to think he was walking away, but Ian stops him. 

“Mickey, you came.” Ian takes his hand on the comforter between them, and looks at Mickey directly, with more intensity than he’s shown all day, “I trust you.”

And Mickey’s never actually had someone tell them they trust him before. And on the Southside, Mickey feels like trust might be just as big if not bigger than love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (US)  
Call: 1-800-273-8255


End file.
